1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a model gun with automatic bullet supplying mechanism, and more particularly to an improvement in a model gun having an automatic bullet supplying mechanism which is operative to supply automatically a bullet holding chamber provided just at the back of a barrel with a sham bullet which is to be shot with gas pressure.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A model gun which is often called an air soft gun is made to imitate a real gun in not only its color and shape but also its apparent operations. As for one of these model guns, which is made to imitate a real gun having a slider provided to be able to move back and forward along a barrel thereof in accordance with triggering action, it has been proposed to make such an arrangement that gas pressure is used for supplying a bullet holding chamber provided just at the back of the barrel with a sham bullet and further for shooting the sham bullet put in the bullet holding chamber, as shown in, for example, Japanese utility model application published before examination under publication number 3-38593. According to the arrangement thus proposed, a pressure accumulating bomb in which compressed air is contained and which has an air leading passage controlled to be open and closed selectively by an operation valve, a magazine for containing sham bullets, first and second valves, first and second air passages and a bullet supplying lever are provided in a grip, an air cylinder is positioned in a slider which is provided to be able to move back and forward along a barrel to be opposite to the rear end of the barrel with a magazine plate between, and a rotary cam engaging with the magazine plate to move the same upward and downward and a spring guide member which moves together with the slider are further provided, so that each of the sham bullets contained in a bullet holding hole formed on the magazine plate is supplied to the inside of the barrel and then shot through the barrel with the compressed air discharged from the pressure accumulating bomb.
In a model gun to which the above mentioned arrangement is applied, when a trigger is pulled, the first valve is caused to operate for permitting the compressed air discharged through the air leading passage opened by the operation valve from the pressure accumulating bomb to be introduced through the first air passage into the inside of the air cylinder and a piston provided in the air cylinder is moved with the pressure of the compressed air to cause the slider to move back. The air cylinder is shifted into the air exhausting condition after the slider has moved back to a predetermined position. The spring guide member also moves back together with the slider to compress a spring member and thereby the rotary cam is rotated to move the magazine plate downward. The bullet holding hole formed on the magazine plate is positioned to be opposite to the sham bullet if the sham bullet is pushed out of the magazine for containing sham bullets when the magazine plate is moved downward. Then, the sham bullet which has been pushed out of the magazine for containing sham bullets is put in the bullet holding hole on the magazine plate by the bullet supplying lever moved together with the trigger.
After that, when the slider moves forward from the backward position to the initial position under a condition wherein the air is exhausted from the air cylinder, the spring member is operative to return the spring guide member to the initial position thereof and therefore the rotary cam is rotated to move the magazine plate upward so that the bullet holding hole formed on the magazine plate in which the sham bullet is put is moved to the initial position to be opposite to the rear end of the barrel. When the magazine plate holding the sham bullet in the bullet holding hole formed thereon has reached the initial position, the second valve is caused to operate for permitting the compressed air discharged through the air leading passage opened by the operation valve from the pressure accumulating bomb to be introduced through the second air passage into the bullet holding hole formed on the magazine plate by a hammer which rotates with the movement of the trigger and the sham bullet put in the bullet holding hole is shot through the barrel with the compressed air introduced into the bullet holding hole.
With the previously proposed model gun in which the air cylinder is provided to form a pressure chamber in the slider which is provided to be movable along the barrel and the sham bullet is supplied to the bullet holding hole formed on the magazine plate by supplying the pressure chamber with the compressed air and discharging the compressed air from the pressure chamber as described above, it is possible to shoot a plurality of sham bullets successively under the automatic bullet supplying operation. However, since an air passage controller which comprises the operation valve, the first and second valves, a connecting portion for keeping the operation valve at the position for opening the air leading passage, a valve control mechanism for controlling the operation of the first valve, the hammer for controlling the operation of the second valve, is constituted as a whole in relatively large scale and so complicated in its construction, it is not easy to make a space in which the air passage controller is to be arranged in the body of the model gun. Besides, the operation valve and the first and second valves which constitute the air passage controller are substantially provided in an air flow space accompanied with the air leading passage extending from the pressure accumulating bomb, and therefore the design of a portion of the model gun forming the air flow space in which the operation valve and the first and second valves constituting the air passage controller are substantially provided, is subjected to relatively severe restrictions.